Kenneth Boulding, a British economist, talks about the need for economic policies that are conscious of our Earth's finite resources and utilizes them in a manner that allow for sustainability. Practitioners of this have begun calling themselves Ecological Economists.
To its practitioners, ecological economics is neither ecology nor economics, but a fusion of both. Their starting point is to recognise that the human economy is part of the natural world. Our environment, they note, is both a source of resources and a sink for wastes.
There are two ways our economies can grow, ecological economists point out: through technological change, or through more intensive use of resources. Only the former, they say, is worth having. They are suspicious of GDP, a crude measure which does not take account of resource depletion, unpaid work, and countless other factors. In its place they advocate more holistic approaches, such as the Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI), a composite index that includes things like the cost of pollution, deforestation and car accidents.
The GPI however, is highly criticized as a subjective measure and should not carry much weight. Either way I believe it is important to consider the effect on the environment when creating economic plans.
5 comments:
I think this is a really interesting topic, especially in light of the Paris Climate talks. I think a GPI-type measurement would be a good idea, however, I feel like it would be hard to implement. Some countries might not tell the truth, especially to boost their status in the world's eyes. I also feel like it would be extremely hard to measure. I do think some kind of measurement for the environment would be extremely helpful. especially because of the renewed interest in the environment.
I think this topic is helpful and interesting. Poeple do need a way to learn about the economy not just through what they have told in the news papers, through a new type of measurment can bring up more information.
I think it is difficult to control as well, the only way to really manage is setting the limits to all industries. The government should raise the concerns to people and use the power of public voice to push the idea of reducing pollution is urgent.
Technological changes in order to grow the economy may not be possible by ecological economics. Though GDP does not account for any of the crude measures taken that affect resource depilation, Genuine Progress Indicator can. Though highly criticized, it can measure the effects externalities have on production. Will it effect economic progress however?
I agree with Emily in that it would be difficult to measure all of these things. Especially for developing countries where there is hardly any data at all on pollution and other ecological measures. Corrupt regimes would have an incentive to not share all of their information. Everyone would have to be on the same page regarding ecology and the threat of climate change, but there is still a large population that doesn't believe that we are undergoing critical changes in our environment due to human activities. The agreement in Paris is a great start, I would say, to getting the international community on the same page. I do believe that shifting to this form of model will take a long expanse of time.
Post a Comment